As determined by the state Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) and the regional Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), the current Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) calls for a target of 31,193 housing units to be built in San Francisco between 2007 and 2014.
With 7,826 market rate units having been produced from 2007 to 2011, market rate production is at 95 percent of the RHNA goal to date with a final goal of 12,315 units, 40 percent of the total RHNA target, by 2014.
With 4,500 affordable units, including those deemed to be affordable for those with household incomes up to 120 percent of the area median, having been produced from 2007 to 2011, the production of affordable housing is at 36 percent of the RHNA goal to date with a final goal of 18,878 units, 60 percent of the total RHNA target, by 2014.
If you just read the comments on this blog, you’d come away believing that The City has been doing nothing but wasting money and time thwarting the creation of market-rate housing in favor of below market rate housing, but the actual result is just the opposite.
From the Bay Guardian Online tuesday, San Francisco’s loss:
I certainly don’t think that median household income in SF doubled between 2000 and 2010, even given the influx of higher-income, highly mobile top one percenters and the concomitant displacement of working class households. The story goes on to discuss the findings of a new study by the Budget and Legislative Analyst, commissioned last July by Sup. David Campos, which reached similar conclusions regarding new housing:
I’ve been thinking for a while, with nothing really to support it, that developers like to build all these luxury, luxe and überluxury units, and that if certain city policies that people like to complain about as being sins against the almighty free market were to disappear tomorrow, it wouldn’t necessarily increase the number of affordable units because developers and owners would just do more to target the top of the income distribution.
^Depends on which policies that you’re talking about. If we were somehow able to eliminate the city-wide height limit, we’d likely see some not so luxe housing being built.
As it is now, so few parcels can even accommodate new housing that any that can have their land prices bid through the roof to the point that only luxury units pencil out. To get this right, we’d really need to do it ALL at once, to eliminate the value capture that folks do now by sitting on land and hoping for a jackpot heigh increase/zoning variance/new neighborhood plan/etc.
Likelihood of this happening? Zero.